Vietnamese Restaurants

February 01, 2017

The food universe operates in unusual ways and I’ve learned to simply go with the flow. In October 2015, I went to Vietnam with my travel buddy and stylist Karen Shinto. My chief aim was to do a little more research about pho. I’d traveled to Vietnam many times since 2003 and on one occasion, reported a pho story for Saveur magazine. This time I was circling back to check in with the pho scene with more depth.

Flying from Phu Quoc island to Hanoi, we were seated next to a young woman who introduced herself and asked if I was from America, what we were up to in Vietnam. Amy Do had overheard my conversation with Karen. She was friendly in an unusual, refreshing way. She was in the hospitality industry and was looking to network. I liked her boldness.

Amy was an orphan raised by a foster mother and explained that since she lacked blood relatives to take care of her, she learned to be more outgoing. Her English was honed by striking up conversations with strangers. Soon we were speaking in Viet-glish. At the end of the two-hour flight, we’d exchanged cell numbers and made a date for the next day: Amy’s foster mother would show Karen and me how she made pho! (To a researcher and writer like me, that kind of invitation is gold.)

May 13, 2016

I’ve been hooked on dim sum since I was young. It’s not only because I love food but also because I love to try many different things. As you know, I like to eat them as much as I like to make them. Here’s a quick A to Z run down that I originally put together for San Francisco magazine. I just updated it for your future dim sum adventures at a restaurant or in your own kitchen.

A is for the vast world of Asian dumplings, many of which originated in China. Chinese restaurants, dim sum houses, and bakeries offer excellent opportunities to sample them, from the steamed and fried to the baked and boiled. Chinese dumplings are often encased in a doughy wrapper or fragrant leaves and involve various flours and starches. They're morsels that you'd eat lots of!

B is for bao, commonly translated as “bun” on menus. It may be plain or stuffed, savory or sweet, leavened or not, and steamed, baked, panfried or deep-fried. Bao originated in China, perhaps as far back as the third century C.E.

C is for chrysanthemum tea (“flower tea”), which pairs nicely with dim sum and is un-caffeinated; a blend of chrysanthemum and pu-erh teas helps to cut the meal’s richness. There’s often Coke (not Pepsi), which goes remarkably well with Chinese food. Champagne is excellent with deep-fried morsels.

November 18, 2015

There is a lot to eat on the streets of Vietnam but one can’t eat standing up or on the sidewalk and in alleyways for every meal of the day. When I’m traveling in Vietnam, I need the occasional restaurant meal. That’s to say, in an establishment with printed menus and a trained wait staff. Customers usually have to walk through an actual door. There’s likely air conditioning and the furniture is not all plastic tables and baby chairs or stools. (If I had my druthers, I’d eat home cooked meals while traveling too, but that is a random occurrence. )

Gail emailed asking for restaurant and cafe recommendations from my October trip to Vietnam. Her brother is visiting next month so I thought I’d share my experiences not just with Gail and her brother, but also with you. Perhaps you’ll add your restaurant or cafe recommendation(s) too?

Let’s start with Saigon (now called Ho Chi Minh City), the city where I was born.

March 10, 2015

The West Coast is a hub for Vietnamese people. Robust Vietnamese-American communities dot cities and suburbs from San Diego to Seattle. Rosa emailed a while back asking for Vietnamese restaurant recommendations in three cities: Seattle, Portland, and San Francisco. An accountant and mom, she’s coming planning a fun vacation with her husband and one-and-a-half year old. Rosa is particularly interested in sampling Vietnamese food on the West Coast. She wrote, “This will be my first time visiting Seattle, Portland, and San Fran. I will be there on vacation. I'm a mom and an accountant. I'm also a second generation immigrant with Vietnamese parents, I grew up wishing I ate 'American' food instead of the odd Vietnamese offerings at our table. As an adult I have come to appreciate Vietnamese cuisine, and wish to experience more of it.”

Rosa is smart and did her homework: “I wiki'ed cities with the highest populations of Vietnamese Americans and was surprised to see Seattle and Portland, and that is about how I determined where we would go on this vacation. I am in search of good Vietnamese food in the U.S.”

I have a very short list of Vietnamese spots and am hoping that you will add to it. Vietnamese restaurants can be inconsistent and plus, we differ in our opinions. Over the weekend, as you may know, I posted a photo on social media of my mom at a pho restaurant in Little Saigon. She had just said, “Homemade is better.” She doesn’t eat out much and rhetorically asked, “Why is there a line to eat here? Because people don’t want to heat up their house to make pho.”

That said, I know that avid home cooks like my mom and I both relish the opportunities for someone else to prepare us food and do the dishes. We’ll gladly pay for it. So where do you enjoy Vietnamese food? My picks, as you’ll see below, are motivated by many factors. I've also included some non-Viet standouts too.

March 18, 2014

The first part of March was kind of loaded with interesting food news. Like a squirrel, I saved up the good stuff for this “Leftovers” post.

ART

“LA Heat” at the Chinese American Museum in downtown Los Angeles looks like a fabulous exhibit on hot sauce art. Specifically, how Asian Sriracha and Mexican Tapatio has affected Los Angeles. Both are homegrown in LA and now major brands in the United States, rivals to Heinz Ketchup and French’s yellow mustard.

Chinese American Museum Los Angeles

The show curator selected a diversity of artists for the exhibit, including Sandra Low, Daniel Gonzalez (above), and Trinh Mai. The roster of supporters reflects LA too, with folks like my friend Randy Clemens (author of the Sriracha Cookbook) helping to sponsor the exhibit.

Catch the exhibit if you’re in Los Angeles. The museum also has great exhibits on the history of Chinese communities in Los Angeles. The building is cool. Chinese food is within walking distance, as is charming Olvera Street.